In this relatively small hypothesis-generating study, high sPD-L1 levels may not be a strong predictor of response to nivolumab in RCC as a solitary marker, but pretreatment sPD-L1 in conjunction with molecular ccrcc clustering/subtyping may prove to be a clinically useful biomarker for nivolumab-refractory disease in RCC. Here, SPDL1 is linked to renal cell carcinoma.